And most people say they can't buy time.
But the thing is... most of us are already "buying" time.
Don't believe me right?
You see, whenever you are buying convenience, you are by right, buying time.
Lazy to cook? Too troublesome? Too messy? Buy dinner from downstairs?
That's buying time. Cos when I prepare my meals, I take an hour or so plus another 30 minutes of cooking. But if you buy food, it's a snap of your fingers and dinner is ready.
If you hire a domestic helper, isn't that similar?
You are tired after work, you want more time to rest, but many people need to do chores. If you don't want to do chores, and you want more time to rest, then you can "buy" time to rest. By hiring a helper at home.
Take a bus, train, car to work? All of them are different.
If you take public transport, you may save some time.
If you take a Grab or taxi, you may save even more time.
If you own a car, maybe you can save the most time cos you won't need to wait for a vehicle to come pick you up, but you may need to find parking at the next location.
Imagine 100 years ago when motor vehicles weren't available. People were riding horses.
If you didn't own a horse then you'd have to walk?
Think that all these don't really mean "BUYING" time?
You see, the thing is... I had this experience in Paris. Transport is pretty expensive. Not like in Singapore.
I was trying to keep my budget low when I was travelling around and sightseeing. So I walked a lot.
And I could see a lot of local sights. But I had difficulty reaching further places. I would have to walk 10km to reach the next attraction that I wanted to see. And this would take me a good half the day, and I had to walk back to the hotel after that.
During the first few days in Paris, I walked around a lot, but I quickly learnt that I just didn't have the time to just keep using my legs to get to places. If I wanted to clear 4-5 attractions in a day, I needed more time if I wanted to walk, else, I would need to "buy" time by paying money.
It's not possible to buy more than 90+ years of lifespan. Or you can't buy more than 24 hours a day. BUT, it's possible to buy more time to do more things within the 24 hours in a day.
And the thing is, we take these conveniences for granted.
Compared to a lot of our ancestors, most of us are already doing a lot of stuff that they couldn't do cos we just have more time than them. We can travel further and faster, communication is faster, we can work on the train, in the plane, etc. But yet, many people still seem to have not enough time.
It's kinda similar to money.
If you earn $2,000, and you spend all the money for living expenses.
Then suddenly you find a cheaper alternative for groceries and now you spend $200 less. So by right you can save $200 for retirement. But instead you upgrade your lifestyle and buy premium meats, cos it's cheaper now, so in the end... still no savings. Then you take for granted the new premium meats and tell yourself that it's basic necessities.
Same same right? Last time no domestic helper. Then after hire a domestic helper, by right supposed to have more time to rest, but in the end still busy, then at this point, don't want to let go of the domestic helper, cos... woah if now so busy, and have domestic helper, imagine what life would be like if don't have domestic helper again...
Thing is... most likely, this person has filled up the free time provided by the domestic helper, with something else and once again, this person has not enough time...
So... think about it, where has all your time gone? Are you spending time doing low value things? Is rest more important? Or exercise? Or watching TV? Or looking at your phone?
Most of us have gotten so used to a certain lifestyle. Same like how we talk about spending money and our financial lifestyle.
But there is also a time lifestyle. And I think we also need to recognize if we are wasting/squandering time, as important as we look at whether we are wasting or squandering money.
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